The Guardian view on Labour and the climate crisis: the £28bn question deserves an answer | Editorial

Sir Keir Starmer has popular plans to green the economy but electoral support is the crucial precondition to make them a reality

Politicians know they can't win an argument without making it. Yet unfortunately that is what Sir Keir Starmer seems to believe. In 2021, the party earmarked 28bn a year for a green industrial strategy to rid the economy of its carbon addiction and create a wave of clean jobs". This summer, however, the spending was postponed to the second half of the next parliament. Then it was reported that it would take a full term to ultimately redeem the pledge. Last week, because of self-imposed fiscal rules, Sir Keir suggested it might not happen. This was unsettling, especially as Labour is miles ahead in the polls. Yet more disappointment is in store. On Tuesday, according to reports, the Labour leader will extol the virtues of small technocratic policies rather than big transformative ones.

Sir Keir is mistaken if he thinks he can avoid a fight by not turning up. British governments are unusually free to overhaul the country's economy, but electoral support is the crucial precondition for such changes. Green policies won't happen by themselves. This week, Cop28 will reach a climax, spotlighting the climate emergency. Inaction is not an option: relying on volatile gas prices would cost Britain double that of achieving 2050 net zero targets. Sir Keir knows that Labour spending will be caricatured as a tax bombshell" by the Tories. Ministers hope to overwhelm facts with emotional force. But Labour should take heart that Rishi Sunak's U-turn on climate targets in September, coupled with a conspiracy-laden assault on the opposition, fell flat with voters.